Easily transportable electronic devices such as telephones, personal media players, cameras, game consoles, personal digital assistants, and the like will be referred to herein as portable electronic devices. Some portable electronic devices can be inserted into a pod, a cradle, a charging station, or a similar base structure through which an electrical charge might be delivered to the portable electronic device and/or data might be transferred to or from the portable electronic device. Any such base structure will be referred to herein as a pod. A portable electronic device may couple to a pod via one or more well known interfaces, such as USB (Universal Serial Bus). The discussion herein will focus on USB, but it should be understood that the embodiments disclosed herein are equally applicable to other interfaces. As used herein, the term “USB” might refer to devices, cables, connectors, or other components that comply with any past, current, or future USB standard, version, or configuration, such as USB 1.0, USB 2.0, USB 3.0, mini-USB, micro-USB, or others, and all such possibilities are contemplated by the embodiments disclosed herein.
Also, as used herein, the terms “couple”, “couples”, and the like might refer to a direct connection without any intervening entities between two coupled components or to an indirect connection where one or more entities intervene between two coupled components. Coupling might be achieved, for example, by inserting one component into another or by abutting one component with another. When two conductive components are coupled, electrical energy and/or data can be transferred between the two components.